"rocambolesque" expressions

[linguoboy]

That actually looks pretty neat. What better way to express that something is between two (or more) things than to stick those things between two 'between's?

With a circumposition?

Speaking of days, the Modern Irish for "today" is inniu. This derives from an oblique form of Old Irish día "day" and, as a result, cannot be used nominally except in conjunction with an lá "the day" (e.g. páipéar an lae inniu "today's paper"). The expression for "nowadays", sa lá atá inniu ann, literally translates as "in the day that there is today".

[enricmm]

Here's an interesting example in Catalan. What you are going to see are all adverbs and work like such.

3 days ago: Abans-d'ahir no, l'altre (Literal translation: Not the day before yesterday, (but) the other)
The day before yesterday: Abans-d'ahir (before-yesterday
Yesterday: Ahir
Today: Avui
Tomorrow: Demà
The day after tomorrow: Demà passat (Tomorrow passed)
Within 3 days: Demà passat no, l'altre (Not tomorrow passed, (but) the other)

If you wonder if we actually use the adverbs abans-d'ahir no, l'altre and demà passat no, l'altre, we actually do, and we do it a lot. AFAIK these are the only syntagms that contain a pause and an elllision that, due to overusage, have become adverbs on their own right. And what about the way we say the hours? Here's an example:

8:00 = Les vuit (eight o'clock)
8:05 = Les vuit i escaig (eight-odd o'clock)
8:10 = Un quart menys cinc de nou (one quarter minus five of nine)
8:15 = Un quart de nou (one quarter of nine)
8:20 = Un quart i cinc de nou (one quarter and five of nine)
8:25 = (Dos) quarts menys cinc de nou ((Two) quarters minus five of nine)
8:30 = (Dos) quarts de nou ((Two) quarters of nine)
8:35 = (Dos) quarts i cinc de nou ((Two) quarters and five of nine)
8:40 = Tres quarts menys cinc de nou (Three quarters minus five of nine)
8:45 = Tres quarts de nou (Three quarters of nine)
8:50 = Tres quarts i cinc de nou (Three quarters and five of nine)
8:55 = Les nou menys cinc (Nine o'clock minus five)
9:00 = Les nou (nine o'clock)

So if you are wondering if the sentence

Not the day before yesterday, the other, we met at quarters minus five of eleven.

makes sense in Catalan, I must tell you that not only it does, but it sounds completely natural to us. In fact, there's no other way to say it.

[kevin]

The expression for in three days and three days ago are funny, but it's not completely unexpected that this becomes somewhat convoluted. It's somewhat surprising that you actually use that in practice. In German, even though "vorvorgestern" exists and is much shorter, in most cases I'd rather refer to the day of the week if it was before yesterday.

However, the really shocking part is plural "quarts" without a number meaning "two quarters", which everyone in their right mind would surely just call a "half" rather than "quarters".

[enricmm]

You can either say quarters or two quarters. Stating the number is optional but the version in which the two is omitted is far more common than the other one.

[vijayjohn]

That actually looks pretty neat. What better way to express that something is between two (or more) things than to stick those things between two 'between's?

With a circumposition?

That would work, too!

3 days ago:

Within 3 days

Y'all have words for those?

[Naava]

3 days ago:

Within 3 days

Y'all have words for those?

Finnish has a word for 'on the day after the day after tomorrow': yliylihuomenna. (huomenna being 'tomorrow' and yli-meaning literally 'over'; each yli- adds +1 day.) You can keep adding yli- as long as you wish, but I think the longest I've ever heard/seen was yliyliylihuomenna aka on the 3rd day after tomorrow.

The same thing can be done with the word aatto, 'eve' (as in Christmas Eve). It's very common to call 23.12 as 'aatonaatto'. By adding the word 'aaton', you go backwards 1 day from whatever the celebration is: eg. 25.12 is joulu, 24,12 is jouluaatto, 23.12 is (joulu)aatonaatto 22.12 would be (joulu)aaton aaton aatto (literally something alike "the eve of the eve of Christmas Eve" ) and so on.

I don't think there's anything for "3 days ago" though.

[enricmm]

3 days ago:

Within 3 days

Y'all have words for those?

Yes, and we actually use them a lot. They clearly belong to daily language, not one of those things you encounter once in a blue moon. In fact they're syntagms that due to usage it can be said they have become adverbs on their own right. Good proof of this is that you can no longer modify them without having it sound ungrammatical.

[Bubulus]

I've sometimes heard anteanteayer for '3 days ago' and pasado pasado mañana for 'in 3 days', but hardly ever.

[vijayjohn]

To be fair, I think I myself have said "the day before the day before yesterday" before and possibly also "the day after the day after tomorrow."

[linguoboy]

The same thing can be done with the word aatto, 'eve' (as in Christmas Eve). It's very common to call 23.12 as 'aatonaatto'. By adding the word 'aaton', you go backwards 1 day from whatever the celebration is: eg. 25.12 is joulu, 24,12 is jouluaatto, 23.12 is (joulu)aatonaatto 22.12 would be (joulu)aaton aaton aatto (literally something alike "the eve of the eve of Christmas Eve" ) and so on.

I have used "Christmas Eve eve" before, but it would be odd to do this with other holidays.

Since the expression "Christmas Eve Day" exists to distinguish the day it falls on from the eve itself, if I wanted to be rocambolesque, I could say "Christmas Eve Day eve".

[vijayjohn]

In Tariana, a Northern Arawakan language spoken in the Vaupés River Basin in Brazil, this is how you say 'this one big hospital of theirs has been made of wood':

Hadapana padapana natapedapana nayadapana hanudapana heku naninidapanamahka.

-dapana is a classifier for houses. Tariana uses classifiers a lot.

[Osias]

It's hard to believe they would actually be that repetitive in actual street conversations, but who knows?

[vijayjohn]

The Vaupés River Basin is in the Amazon rainforest in Amazonas. There are no streets. Tariana is probably the most endangered language in its immediate vicinity, though.

You're right, though, it's not always that pervasive.

[OldBoring]

In China all subway stations have a 站 (station) at the end.
But what happens if the station name itself is a station, such as a railway station?
In Beijing they simply use the word station once. So the subway station at Xidan is named 西单站 (Xidan station) but the subway station at the Beijing railway station is simply named 北京站 (literally "Beijing station" - the English translation is "Beijing Railway Station").

But what happens in other cities? In Tianjin (aka Tientsin) the railway station's subway station is named 天津站站 (Tianjin station station).
What happens when they talk about the platforms of that station? 天津站站站台 - Tianjin station station station-deck (station-deck being the Chinese phrasing for "platform").

[vijayjohn]

站站? That sounds kind of cute.

Apparently, in Wenzhou, it's just 温州站, though. So how many cities are like Tianjin that way? Or is it just a Tianjin thing?

[Osias]

The Vaupés River Basin is in the Amazon rainforest in Amazonas. There are no streets.

Neither hospitals, I think, that phrase would be said when they went into a city seeking for medical care.

[vijayjohn]

The Vaupés River Basin is in the Amazon rainforest in Amazonas. There are no streets.

Neither (N)or hospitals, I think, that phrase would be said when they went into a city seeking for medical care.

My understanding is that the only people in the Vaupés who ever go into the city are the Tukano, so all contact with the outside world is through them and never direct, except when the Brazilian government approves outsiders (i.e. researchers) to go in. The hospital in question was probably built by missionaries or something.

[Osias]

Deixa a FUNAI saber disso!

(I writing this in Portuguese because I'm not sure how to say it in English without another "rocambolesque" expression. It's not the same as the literal translation "Let FUNAI know about this", that sounds like I'm telling you to go to tell FUNAI, denounce it to them.

It's more like "let's see what happen when people of FUNAI realize there are missionaries messing with an isolated tribe." (it was a joke, if we know that much about their language, I don't think they are that isolated anymore) )

[vijayjohn]

They are pretty isolated, but there's been a lot of interest in Amazonian languages in linguistics departments in recent years and probably more funding allotted to people working on them than to people working on most other languages. I'm not sure, but I think missionary activity may have ended around the time FUNAI was founded.

[Osias]

I heard on TV today the expression "no que se refere a X" and recalled that comedian from YouTube, Whindersson, using it to make an impression of former president Dilma. I tried to come up with an English equivalent, maybe it's "Talking about X"

Example: no que se refere ao Brasil, ele é um país rico.

Then I wondered that's like the particle wa in Japanese, the Portuguese equivalent being very rocambolesque in comparison.